John Marshall. philosophers, who deal alone with abstract principles. He did not express himself in the language of the poet. He did not attempt to show, nor did he believe that the maxim, vox fopidi vox Dei, is or ever was to be accepted as literally correct, but he always recognized that in free governments, sovereignty, in the most comprehensive sense, resides with and inheres in the people. Organized govern ment embraces that portion of the original and illimitable power of the people they may choose to impart to the agencies they insti tute. Original sovereignty is one thing, del egated sovereignty another, and this distinc tion he never lost sight of. He realized to the fullest extent that "Power in the people is like light in the sun — native, original, in herent and unlimited by anything human. In government it may be compared with the reflected light of the moon, for it is only bor rowed, delegated and limited by the inten tion of the people, whose it is, and to whom Governors are to consider themselves as re sponsible, while the people are responsible only to God; themselves being the losers, if they pursue a false scheme of politics." Constitutions do not create individual rights or impart them to those by whom constitutions are ordained. The rights of persons are original, not delegated. Magna Charta, Bills of Right, the Petition of Right and our State and Federal consti tutions, are intended to guarantee, preserve and protect those attributes of men that are inherent and indefeasible. Government is a necessity with civilized man, but it emanates from the sovereignty of the people and re mains at all times subject to such changes or modifications as that sovereignty may de cree. The philosophy, I may say the framework, of our government, was thus epitomized by the great Chief Justice: When the American people created a Na tional Legislature, with certain enumerated powers, it was neither necessary nor proper to define the powers retained by the States. These powers proceeded not from the people of America, but from the people of the sev
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eral States; and remain, after the adoption of the Constitution, what they were before, except so far as they may be abridged by that instrument. He was a "State's rights" man, in that he respected and on all occasions upheld the rights and powers reserved by the States and the people, but he undeviatingly advocated "the preservation of the general government, in its whole constitutional vigor, as the sheet anchor of our peace at home and safety abroad." г The great constitutional questions of Mar shall's day may be stated in gênerai terms thus: Is the Federal government the final judge of the extent of its own powers under the Constitution? Is the Supreme Court bound to take the law of its decisions as Congress or the Presi dent, or some State authority may prescribe it, or is it an independent tribunal, endowed with full power finally and authoritatively to construe the Constitution and to judge of the limits and extent of its own jurisdiction? Is the Federal government a sovereign na tion, established by and acting upon the peo ple, or is it a mere compact — a treaty among sovereign States — whereof no common and final judge is provided? And subsidiary, in logic, to these, though yet greater in consequences, was that other momentous question: Is the Federal union perpetual, or may it be at any time dissolved by the. action of one or more of its mem bers? To the solution of these great questions, sounding in political considerations of the highest import, fraught with the deepest sig nificance to all future generations of Ameri cans, John Marshall brought all the re sources of a great, original mind; he brought a legal learning so far removed from pedan try that it has even been disputed that he was learned at all; he brought a logical 1 Senator Lindsay.
